Funny People

I only happened to see the last 45 min of this movie (Directed: Judd Apatow 2009).  I didn't really care all that much for the movie itself; seemed disjointed and a little misguided. 

But, this movie does agree at a general level with something I have long thought--comedians are miserable.  Not sure if it is because it is so hard to live as a performer in such a vacuous, unrealistic framework of bullshit or if it is more related to the basic tenet of 'no one truly loves what they get paid to do'.

We all know the saying; 'Do what you love', but that is more about making your working hours comfortable.  They neglect to mention that you will slowly come to resent a good portion of this thing, whatever it is, as it becomes the way you make a living.  Making a living isn't easy and so what happens is you slowly build resentments.  You don't want to do it EVERYDAY, but having no recourse you get up and do it every day, rain or shine and slowly build resentment.

So I have amended the saying to read; 'Do what you like, but be careful that you don't fuck with something you love.'

I will also reach out and grab a saying that we can all relate to; 'Don't Shit Where You Eat'.  I think about the life of a comedian and how hard it must be to wrap 'be funny' around 'support yourself financially' and I think I'll stick to cracking myself up when I want, and doing something I enjoy, or is at least palatable to pay the bills.